The Crazy PCA Stats and Tidbits Thread

[Rcal10]

1 hour ago, Bull said:

While I agree with your point, it's generally not a good idea to be condescending AND misspell you're in the same sentence. 

Normally my response would be an angry one to this. But you’re absolutely correct. And I do that more often than I like to admit. Your response, while it may be a bit condescending and nitpicking, is spot on. Thank you for the English lesson. 

Edited September 20 by Rcal10

[Geographyhater8888]

11 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

Normally my response would be an angry one to this. But you’re absolutely correct. And I do that more often than I like to admit. Your response, while it may be a bit condescending and nitpicking, is spot on. Thank you for the English lesson. 

He was condescending first. “Tell me you don’t watch ball” is provocative and you responded appropriately. 
 

The guy’s probably a troll and a hilarious one too. 

Edited September 20 by Geographyhater8888

[Rcal10]

2 minutes ago, Geographyhater8888 said:

He was condescending first. “Tell me you don’t watch ball” is provocative and you responded appropriately. 
 

The guy’s probably a troll and a hilarious one too. 

It was the your versus you’re that I got wrong.😬. That is what Bull pointed out. You know, because we all all use proper grammar and never make spelling mistakes🤮

Definitely his response to me was condescending and warranted a similar response. 

[Bull]

5 hours ago, Rcal10 said:

It was the your versus you’re that I got wrong.😬. That is what Bull pointed out. You know, because we all all use proper grammar and never make spelling mistakes🤮

Definitely his response to me was condescending and warranted a similar response. 

More trying to be funny/ diffuse. I failed.

[Rcal10]

10 minutes ago, Bull said:

More trying to be funny/ diffuse. I failed.

You’re good. 

[bukie]

6 games left. PCA at 10.5 fWAR, still first in offensive runs over average and first in defensive runs over average. Can he hold off Alvarez on offense and Witt on defense? 

EDIT: It adjusted overnight to 10.4, offense dipped a bit so he's just behind Alvarez, 55.9 to 56.2.

Edited Monday at 02:25 PM by bukie

[We Got The Whole 9]

Up to 10.6 today. Has a chance to lead 2 legs of the triple crown. LFG Pete, these bums need you desperately. 

[bukie]

Pete also happens to lead the MLB in plate appearances with 708. That's going to happen, though, when you are the leadoff hitter of the best offense in baseball.

[Javy Is Still A Cub]

"2026 Seiya Suzuki is like a 1987 Dawson that was willing to take walks.

 

 

Whuooooowwwwwww! That knocked my head back! 

I can say that nobody who actually saw them both believes that for a second - noooohhhhbahhhdeeeeee. 

Wow. This is actually very informative. It's amazing what people will assume just from statistics; just from a few dozen numbers; how it makes them assume they have the equivalent experience and knowledge of someone who spent six months watching Dawson in 1987. 

Anyway... back to the PCA goodness, no more of the WAR foolishtic business. I'll resume with a tidbit: 

Pete is in the 99th percentile of people of cool in the genre of people with hyphenated names. If he just chose one - they would both be equally cool: Pete Crow is like a comic book name, and Pete Armstrong is like a baseball comic book name. I consider this to be more of a crazy stat than a tidbit, personally.   

Edited Wednesday at 07:47 PM by Javy Is Still A Cub
That's seems like a very forward question - not appreciated.

[Rcal10]

4 hours ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

Whuooooowwwwwww! That knocked my head back! 

I can say that nobody who actually saw them both believes that for a second - noooohhhhbahhhdeeeeee. 

Wow. This is actually very informative. It's amazing what people will assume just from statistics; just from a few dozen numbers; how it makes them assume they have the equivalent experience and knowledge of someone who spent six months watching Dawson in 1987. 

Anyway... back to the PCA goodness, no more of the WAR foolishtic business. I'll resume with a tidbit: 

Pete is in the 99th percentile of people of cool in the genre of people with hyphenated names. If he just chose one - they would both be equally cool: Pete Crow is like a comic book name, and Pete Armstrong is like a baseball comic book name. I consider this to be more of a crazy stat than a tidbit, personally.   

What are you responding too? 

Edited Thursday at 12:14 AM by Rcal10

[We Got The Whole 9]

38 minutes ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

"2026 Seiya Suzuki is like a 1987 Dawson that was willing to take walks.

 

 

Whuooooowwwwwww! That knocked my head back! 

I can say that nobody who actually saw them both believes that for a second - noooohhhhbahhhdeeeeee. 

Wow. This is actually very informative. It's amazing what people will assume just from statistics; just from a few dozen numbers; how it makes them assume they have the equivalent experience and knowledge of someone who spent six months watching Dawson in 1987. 

Anyway... back to the PCA goodness, no more of the WAR foolishtic business. I'll resume with a tidbit: 

Pete is in the 99th percentile of people of cool in the genre of people with hyphenated names. If he just chose one - they would both be equally cool: Pete Crow is like a comic book name, and Pete Armstrong is like a baseball comic book name. I consider this to be more of a crazy stat than a tidbit, personally.   

Dude you're not the only one here who witnessed 1987. I'm sure you didn't watch many other teams games that year either. Personally I love to know how a player performs compared to their peers. Statistics allow us to do that. No matter how much experience you have watching baseball you can't possibly give us a better scope on performance than stats.

 

In 1987 Andre Dawson was 24% better than the league average hitter. He didn't like to walk and 40 players across baseball had more impact offensively, 14 in the NL. He didn't provide much value in the field or on the paths. He really didn't deserve the MVP. Would you give Matt Olson the MVP this year? Very similar seasons. 

 

Pete is the 2nd best hitter in baseball, the best fielder at the hardest position, and is gonna steal 40 bags while blowing the competition away in runs scored. 

 

Yes he's been 3x better than Dawson.

[Javy Is Still A Cub]

Oops - bad post, previously. 

3x better than Dawson on bWar. 2026 Seiya is almost 20% better. As you like.... 

Edited Wednesday at 11:21 PM by Javy Is Still A Cub
I was contacted by some scary people.

[javy knows my name]

3 hours ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

"2026 Seiya Suzuki is like a 1987 Dawson that was willing to take walks.

 

 

Whuooooowwwwwww! That knocked my head back! 

I can say that nobody who actually saw them both believes that for a second - noooohhhhbahhhdeeeeee. 

Wow. This is actually very informative. It's amazing what people will assume just from statistics; just from a few dozen numbers; how it makes them assume they have the equivalent experience and knowledge of someone who spent six months watching Dawson in 1987. 

Anyway... back to the PCA goodness, no more of the WAR foolishtic business. I'll resume with a tidbit: 

Pete is in the 99th percentile of people of cool in the genre of people with hyphenated names. If he just chose one - they would both be equally cool: Pete Crow is like a comic book name, and Pete Armstrong is like a baseball comic book name. I consider this to be more of a crazy stat than a tidbit, personally.   

This is blatant trolling. Get out of our happy PCA thread with your willfully ignorant nonsense

[bukie]

[Geographyhater8888]

10 hours ago, javy knows my name said:

This is blatant trolling. Get out of our happy PCA thread with your willfully ignorant nonsense

@Banks-Williams is much more entertaining than this guy and if not sincere, a lot more convincing as a troll.

Edited Thursday at 10:20 AM by Geographyhater8888

[Javy Is Still A Cub]

Says a lot about the state of this country when someone who disagrees with just a minor point (WAR is not the end-all-be-all) - but still agrees with the overall point - (hey, I'm a Cub fan who loves PCA!) still gets labeled as a "troll" and kicked out.

"March or die", I guess 🙄  

That's what the real winners here say, not the average poster, I know. Me, I say resist WAR McCarthyism!!! 

[17 Seconds]

4 minutes ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

Says a lot about the state of this country when someone who disagrees with just a minor point (WAR is not the end-all-be-all) - but still agrees with the overall point - (hey, I'm a Cub fan who loves PCA!) still gets labeled as a "troll" and kicked out.

"March or die", I guess 🙄  

That's what the real winners here say, not the average poster, I know. Me, I say resist WAR McCarthyism!!! 

jason ross was extremely gracious with you, and you ignored all his points and just came back with more antagonistic nonsense

[Jason Ross]

40 minutes ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

 Says a lot about the state of this country when someone who disagrees with just a minor point (WAR is not the end-all-be-all) - but still agrees with the overall point - (hey, I'm a Cub fan who loves PCA!) still gets labeled as a "troll" and kicked out.

"March or die", I guess 🙄  

That's what the real winners here say, not the average poster, I know. Me, I say resist WAR McCarthyism!!! 

The biggest issue people have is that you really haven't demonstrated a knowledge or understanding of what WAR does. The basis of your argument can boiled down to "It can't be true because it doesn't feel right to me". Do you have a statistical issue with the inputs? Is there a flaw in wRC+ you'd like to explain? Do you have articles and research done by others to support your opinion? I've seen nothing of the sort. These kinds of things would help your case significantly.

This isn't a witch hunt. Nor is it McCarthyism. Lest us not forget; the board didn't seek out the WAR-non believer, you came in to argue WAR and then have been defensive when people have pressed you on it. That's not usually the sign of someone who has anything to support their point of view. And usually, it's the sign of someone who is a troll; just looking to get a rise out of people. It's hard to blame anyone for that at this point.

On the flip side, plenty of people here have brought real data to explain WAR to you and why it would give the massive edge to Pete, but you've seemingly ignored it. Putting your head into the sand isn't a defensive mechanism that many will find admirable. Which leads us to here; the decrying of a witch hunt because everyone disagrees with you, largely because you refuse to bring anything tangible to the table. 

[Javy Is Still A Cub]

I don't see how someone talking about WAR critically is a "troll" - I do see how it makes me an infidel to the fundamentalists. However, I'm going to assume the impossible will happen: this will be the last word on the issue, which allows me to go back to lurking and this thread to get back to PCA. I think we can all agree on that (unless your'e one of those "march or die" posters). 

I have things to do after all, and that includes getting better at actually playing baseball: In my 30+ men's baseball league I'm batting .484/.583/.677 for the entire year, but there's room for improvement. That doesn't include Sunday's 2/2, 2 sacrifice flies (both rbis), RBI double.

That performance at the plate wasn't anywhere as important to the win and to the team as the 4-inning, 1 ER save I pitched... but for people who believe PCA's great 2026 season is worth more than Bruce Sutter's entire, Cy Young-as-a-relief-pitcher winning tenure as a Cub, lol, I can't spend the time explaining why that's wrong any more than I can try to suss out why Dawson's 1987 .287/.328/.568 league leading 49 Hr and 137 RBIs is only worth 3.5 fWAR, but his 1988 .309/.344/.504 24 HR 79 Rbis is worth 4.2 fWAR, when they both played 153+ games and had the same (according to fWAR, LOL) near-neutral defense. The answer is: the WAR emperor has no clothes, but back to PCA!!!!! 

Thank you for your attention to this matter, and go Cubs! 

Edited Friday at 11:41 PM by Javy Is Still A Cub
Forgot the 1 earned run!

[Rcal10]

12 minutes ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

I don't see how someone talking about WAR critically is a "troll" - I do see how it makes me an infidel to the fundamentalists. However, I'm going to assume the impossible will happen: this will be the last word on the issue, which allows me to go back to lurking and this thread to get back to PCA. I think we can all agree on that (unless your'e one of those "march or die" posters). 

I have things to do after all, and that includes getting better at actually playing baseball: In my 30+ men's baseball league I'm batting .484/.583/.677 for the entire year, but there's room for improvement. That doesn't include Sunday's 2/2, 2 sacrifice flies (both rbis), RBI double.

That performance at the plate wasn't anywhere as important to the win and to the team as the 4-inning save I pitched... but for people who believe PCA's great 2026 season is worth more than Bruce Sutter's entire, MVP-as-a-pitcher winning tenure as a Cub, lol, I can't spend the time explaining why that's wrong any more than I can try to suss out why Dawson's 1987 .287/.328/.568 league leading 49 Hr and 137 RBIs is only worth 3.5 fWAR, but his 1988 .309/.344/.504 24 HR 79 Rbis is worth 4.2 fWAR, when they both played 153+ games and had the same (according to fWAR, LOL) near-neutral defense. The answer is: the WAR emperor has no clothes, but back to PCA!!!!! 

Thank you for your attention to this matter, and go Cubs! 

How about someone who insults someone by suggesting if they don’t agree with that person they obviously don’t know baseball? Is that a troll like comment? 

[muntjack]

16 minutes ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

In my 30+ men's baseball league I'm batting .484/.583/.677 for the entire year, but there's room for improvement. That doesn't include Sunday's 2/2, 2 sacrifice flies (both rbis), RBI double.

 

I think this argument is over. *Drops mic*

Edited Thursday at 03:30 PM by muntjack

[mul21]

29 minutes ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

I don't see how someone talking about WAR critically is a "troll" - I do see how it makes me an infidel to the fundamentalists. However, I'm going to assume the impossible will happen: this will be the last word on the issue, which allows me to go back to lurking and this thread to get back to PCA. I think we can all agree on that (unless your'e one of those "march or die" posters). 

I have things to do after all, and that includes getting better at actually playing baseball: In my 30+ men's baseball league I'm batting .484/.583/.677 for the entire year, but there's room for improvement. That doesn't include Sunday's 2/2, 2 sacrifice flies (both rbis), RBI double.

That performance at the plate wasn't anywhere as important to the win and to the team as the 4-inning save I pitched... but for people who believe PCA's great 2026 season is worth more than Bruce Sutter's entire, MVP-as-a-pitcher winning tenure as a Cub, lol, I can't spend the time explaining why that's wrong any more than I can try to suss out why Dawson's 1987 .287/.328/.568 league leading 49 Hr and 137 RBIs is only worth 3.5 fWAR, but his 1988 .309/.344/.504 24 HR 79 Rbis is worth 4.2 fWAR, when they both played 153+ games and had the same (according to fWAR, LOL) near-neutral defense. The answer is: the WAR emperor has no clothes, but back to PCA!!!!! 

Thank you for your attention to this matter, and go Cubs! 

It's because you continue to fail to understand that the single most important thing a hitter can do is not make an out and PCA is miles better than that than Dawson was, especially in his MVP year.

[We Got The Whole 9]

25 minutes ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

I don't see how someone talking about WAR critically is a "troll" - I do see how it makes me an infidel to the fundamentalists. However, I'm going to assume the impossible will happen: this will be the last word on the issue, which allows me to go back to lurking and this thread to get back to PCA. I think we can all agree on that (unless your'e one of those "march or die" posters). 

I have things to do after all, and that includes getting better at actually playing baseball: In my 30+ men's baseball league I'm batting .484/.583/.677 for the entire year, but there's room for improvement. That doesn't include Sunday's 2/2, 2 sacrifice flies (both rbis), RBI double.

That performance at the plate wasn't anywhere as important to the win and to the team as the 4-inning save I pitched... but for people who believe PCA's great 2026 season is worth more than Bruce Sutter's entire, MVP-as-a-pitcher winning tenure as a Cub, lol, I can't spend the time explaining why that's wrong any more than I can try to suss out why Dawson's 1987 .287/.328/.568 league leading 49 Hr and 137 RBIs is only worth 3.5 fWAR, but his 1988 .309/.344/.504 24 HR 79 Rbis is worth 4.2 fWAR, when they both played 153+ games and had the same (according to fWAR, LOL) near-neutral defense. The answer is: the WAR emperor has no clothes, but back to PCA!!!!! 

Thank you for your attention to this matter, and go Cubs! 

Have you actually looked at leaderboards for 87 and 88? Do you like walks and OBP? Thats really what it boils down to. 

 

Jack Clark had a slash of 286/459/597nin 1987. Are you really going to take Dawson over that? 

 

Strawberry 284/398/583

Guerrero 338/416/539

Davis 293/399/593

Gwynn 370/447/511

Murphy 295/417/580

 

Dawson 287/328/568

 

You are overrating his season out of bias

[sneakypower]

1 hour ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

I can't spend the time explaining why that's wrong any more than I can try to suss out why Dawson's 1987 .287/.328/.568 league leading 49 Hr and 137 RBIs is only worth 3.5 fWAR, but his 1988 .309/.344/.504 24 HR 79 Rbis is worth 4.2 fWAR, when they both played 153+ games and had the same (according to fWAR, LOL) near-neutral defense. The answer is: the WAR emperor has no clothes, but back to PCA!!!!! 

Thank you for your attention to this matter, and go Cubs!

assuming that this is a good faith pursuit, the main reason for this is basically that MLB likely juiced baseballs in 1987, and course-corrected the next year; hitting 50 HR while impressive is made less valuable in a diluted run-scoring environment where about every good player topped 20 HR

if you google rabbit ball you'll find many good writeups about it

Edited Thursday at 04:17 PM by sneakypower

[Jason Ross]

1 hour ago, Javy Is Still A Cub said:

That performance at the plate wasn't anywhere as important to the win and to the team as the 4-inning, 1 ER save I pitched... but for people who believe PCA's great 2026 season is worth more than Bruce Sutter's entire, MVP-as-a-pitcher winning tenure as a Cub, lol, I can't spend the time explaining why that's wrong any more than I can try to suss out why Dawson's 1987 .287/.328/.568 league leading 49 Hr and 137 RBIs is only worth 3.5 fWAR, but his 1988 .309/.344/.504 24 HR 79 Rbis is worth 4.2 fWAR, when they both played 153+ games and had the same (according to fWAR, LOL) near-neutral defense. The answer is: the WAR emperor has no clothes, but back to PCA!!!!! 

Thank you for your attention to this matter, and go Cubs! 

In the nicest possible way, this has been explained to you a few times. One of those people who explained it to you was me, days ago. 

Quote

Let me try to explain to what fWAR is trying to say, and what you're simply missing.
1. In 1987, league offense was much better across the board. League average OPS was .747 and in 2026 league average is .719. What Pete is doing is much more impressive when we consider the scoring environment. Dawson was 24% better than average and PCA is 59% better than average. It's not even close. Put another way: Dawson was the 41st best offensive player in 1987 in MLB. Pete is the second. (Pete would have been the fourth best player offensive in '87)
2. Andre Dawson was a RF, and Pete Crow-Armstrong was a CF. CF is just a vastly more valuable position; it requires skills and tools that RF does not. fWAR gives proper boost for positions. RF is one of the most readily found positions and CF one of the hardest.
3. Dawson was an okay runner. Pete Crow-Armstrong is an elite one. 
4. PCA is a generational fielder. The type of defensive player we see pop up at his position maybe every 20 years. Dawson in 1987 was, with the tools we have merely "okay" defensively. When you factor in the positional aspect, it skews it greatly. And once again, it's not even close.

The answer is that every year is different. Every ball park is different. This is why we have wRC+. The "+" signifies that. We neutralize the data; steroid-era hitters and dead-ball era hitters would be impossible to compare without context and the "+" is the context. Without getting into the weeds of it all it just puts everyone on an even playing field and adjusts for all the things a hitter isn't in control of (run scoring environment, pitching, the ball, etc). It's why Dawson could be the 41st best hitter in 1987 even though he hit a bunch of home runs. And why Pete is a much better hitter in 2026 than Dawson was in 1987 even if the raw data makes it seem close.

And this is exactly why I keep saying you don't really understand WAR. If you did, this would be foundational to you: WAR is designed to do this at it's core. And if you don't know that (and there's no shame in not knowing; learning is a cool thing! But we can't learn until we accept what we don't know, either), which it appears you don't, then of course it's confusing. But that isn't a flaw within WAR, either. And why others are frustrated with the round-and-round here; you're blaming WAR for things WAR isn't at fault for.

Lastly, on the defense, I have no idea what you are talking about, however when you say they were "near neutral" value. Dawson's fielding value was a -7.7. This means he was worth, roughly -8 runs for his defense. Part of this is his positional adjustment; RF isn't valuable. But Pete Crow-Armstrong has been worth 23.7 FV, or roughly,. 24 runs over the course of a season. We generally accept that 10 runs = 1 win. Napkin math tells you right there where almost 3+ wins of his fWAR comes from. That's a massive difference in value.

Sadly we don't have the defensive tools to go back and exactly explain how good/bad Dawson was. We have far more data-driven models because of all the cool tech we have. But based on the numbers we have, Dawson wasn't grading out as a plus right fielder. Based on Total Zone rating, which is about as advanced as we can get for the era, Dawson was the 12th best RF'er in baseball. Pete Crow-Armstrong is above and beyond the best center fielder this year. To the point he's closer to being 2x the second best at his position than he is the 3rd best defender at his position.